2024 US election: Your complete guide

This year’s race for the White House will be one of the most unusual – and historically consequential – the nation has seen

The race for the White House in 2024 has begun in what will likely be one of the most bitterly fought US elections.
As the polls stand, it seems likely this year’s election will be a rerun of 2020 with Donald Trump hoping to reverse his defeat by Joe Biden.
But despite both men polling way ahead of their rivals, there is little enthusiasm among voters for either candidate.
Mr Biden’s critics say the Democratic president is too old to seek a second term, at the end of which he would be 86. As a result of his son’s controversial business dealings, the president is also in danger of being mired in scandal, albeit by association.
Mr Trump, who will be 78 when voters go to the polls, is facing 91 criminal counts across four indictments and is expected to go on trial during the height of the election campaign.
There is no doubt the 2024 election contest will be one of the most unusual  – and historically consequential – the nation has seen. 
The US election day will be held on Tuesday, November 5 2024.
The winner will serve four years in the White House starting from their inauguration on January 20 2025.
Voters will be electing not just a president, but Congressional candidates for seats in the House of Representatives and the US Senate.
The first stage of the 2024 elections will see the two main political parties select their presidential candidates through either primary elections or caucuses in each state.
For the Republicans, Iowa will go first on Jan 15, followed by New Hampshire a week later. The race typically reaches a decisive point by March 5, when more than a dozen states vote at once in what is known as Super Tuesday.
Primaries are regular elections to choose delegates for the party convention, where the party’s final candidate is confirmed. Some states rely on the caucus system where party members gather in person and debate who should be the candidate before choosing delegates accordingly.
There are important differences between the parties. The Republicans hold a secret ballot in caucuses, while the Democrats form groups and hold a succession of votes, with candidates who get less than 15 per cent of votes dropping out, and their supporters picking an alternative.
Delegates then gather at their national convention in the summer to nominate the presidential candidates.
While voters in the general election are in theory selecting their choice for president, in reality, they are choosing delegates for the electoral college.
All 50 US states and Washington DC have a set number of electors in the electoral college, roughly proportional to the population size of the state.
All but two states, Maine and Nebraska, use a winner-takes-all system – which means that if a candidate wins the most votes in a state, they take its entire haul of electoral college votes.
In order to become president, either candidate needs to win a majority of the 538 electors in the electoral college – so 270.
Critics have questioned the electoral college system because it does not guarantee the most popular candidate gets to the White House.
For example, in 2016 Hillary Clinton won 48.2 per cent of all votes across the US and Mr Trump 46.1 per cent. But as he won more states, sometimes by a narrow margin, he was elected president.
The 2024 election will be the first since the 2020 census changed the make-up of the electoral college to adapt to shifting population sizes in each state.
Texas has gained two electoral votes, while Colorado, Florida, Montana, North Carolina, and Oregon each gained one. California, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia each lost one.
Super Tuesday is typically the most consequential date in the campaign calendar apart from election day itself.
It sees more than a dozen states vote for Republican and Democrat candidates at once, and the results normally lead to a clear favourite emerging and less popular candidates dropping out of the race.
In 2024, Super Tuesday falls on March 5 – just a day after Mr Trump’s first federal criminal trial is expected to begin.
In 2016, the last time Mr Trump competed in an open Republican primary, he clinched the nomination by late May when his last rivals dropped out.
In 2020, Super Tuesday also helped Mr Biden take a massive step towards the nomination after Elizabeth Warren refused to drop out and split the Left-wing vote, much to the fury of supporters of Bernie Sanders.
The road to the White House effectively runs through a few critical battleground states, which play an outsized role on election day.
The states are typically divided, and flip between Democrat and Republican with a narrow margin of victory.
Pennsylvania, and its 19 electoral college votes, has proved to be a critical state in the last few presidential elections, and 2024 is no different.
Mr Trump, or any other Republican candidate, will also have to flip Arizona, Georgia, Wisconsin and Nevada, which Mr Biden narrowly carried in 2020 to win the presidency.
Florida and Ohio, once considered marginal, have been safe Republican territory in recent elections. However, nothing is set in stone.
The majority of voters go to the polls and ballots are counted. Many people may have already cast their vote ahead of time using the postal voting system or early voting.
Votes are counted in each state after their respective polls close. Poll close times vary from state to state but generally begin from around 7pm local time.
The range of time zones across the US means that on the east coast, ballots will have been tabulated while voters in states like Alaska and Hawaii are still making their way to the polls.
The winner of the election will likely not be projected for days. Even then, the results are not properly finalised for months. However, states and the whole election result are typically “called” long before final votes are counted.
In practice, yes. The Constitution does not bar a natural-born citizen over 35 from running for the White House.
The former president has insisted that he will continue his campaign even if convicted and sentenced on any of the 91 criminal counts he has been indicted over.
There is historical precedent. In 1920, Eugene Debs ran for president on behalf of the Socialist Party despite serving 10 years for three counts of violating the Espionage and Sedition Acts.
He even ran his campaign from his prison cell at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, with the authorities allowing him to issue a weekly political statement to the press.
There is one caveat. The 14th Amendment, passed after the Civil War, contains a clause barring anyone who “engaged in insurrection” from office. Some campaigners are pursuing this through the courts in various states, but an outright ban remains unlikely.
However, in the eyes of many political pundits, a serious conviction is likely to damage Mr Trump’s reputation, and subsequently his electability.
Even veteran Republican insiders admit they are very unsure of how a conviction would affect Mr Trump’s campaign. As they point out, the indictment of the former president has plunged the US into uncharted waters.
In the Republican primary race, Mr Trump is currently the standout candidate, commanding around 60 per cent of support in national surveys.
Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, once viewed as a strong challenger, has seen his polling numbers slump. Meanwhile, Nikki Haley has seen a boost in the polls and is considered a serious challenger to Mr Trump.
Polls on a general election rematch between Mr Biden and Mr Trump consistently show a very tight race. A string of recent polls which suggested Mr Trump is leading Mr Biden in a number of critical states have caused alarm among Democrats.
But while both candidates are polling way ahead of their party rivals, they remain largely unpopular among the whole electorate, with low approval ratings.
Mr Biden’s critics say the Democratic president is too old to seek a second term which would end in his 86th year. His son is also mired in scandal over his business deals.
Mr Trump, who will be 78 when voters go to the polls, is facing 91 criminal counts across four indictments with several cases expected to go to trial during the height of the election campaign.
The general election will also decide control of Congress, which is made up of the House of Representatives and the Senate.
Currently, the Republicans control the House of Representatives by a small majority (currently 221 – 213) and Democrats control the Senate by an even more razor thin margin (51-49).
Polls suggest control of both chambers could flip in 2024.
Members of the House serve two-year terms and every single seat in the chamber will be on the ballot in 2024.
Senators, however, serve six-year terms and elections to the senate are staggered so that only about a third of the chamber is up for re-election.
Democrats need a net gain of just five seats to claim the House.
Meanwhile, Republicans have high hopes of seizing the Senate since the electoral map is so favourable to them this cycle. The GOP needs just two more seats to gain the majority.
This article is kept updated with the latest information for the 2024 election.